Matchstick Souls
by silvaaeterna
Summary: He doesn't believe in anything, but he might make a concession or two for Matt's sake. (Matt x Near. Post-canon ret-con. Oneshot.)


**Summary:** He doesn't believe in anything, but he might make a concession or two for Matt's sake. (Matt x Near. Post-canon ret-con. Oneshot.)

* * *

 **Matchstick Souls**

"Do you ever see Mello?"

"...he's dead, Matt."

"Well _duh_ , genius." Matt leaned as far back as his chair would allow and propped his boots up on the desk. He let his foot twitch precariously close to the matchstick tower that had been growing there since yesterday.

"So essentially you're asking if I'm delusional."

Matt sighed, and his whole body rattled with it. "I'm asking... hell, I don't know what I'm asking _you_ for. Nevermind."

The matchstick about to be added to the tower twirled between lily-white fingers. "You know that being vague will only make me pry."

Matt scowled, arms crossed over his chest. "And _you_ know I don't like you goin' all detective-mode on me."

Near flicked the matchstick at his face, and Matt sputtered, defensive mask broken.

"It's clearly bothering you. Ask it."

"Ugh, well... it's hard to put into words, damn it." Matt pulled his feet off the desk, careful not to disturb the tower, and leaned over the chair's armrest instead so he could look Near in the eye. "Do you think there's an afterlife?"

"As in Heaven and Hell?" Near pulled one leg up into his chair with him, hugging the knee lightly.

"As in... _anything_. Do you think we have souls? Some form of ourselves that outlasts our corporeal existence?"

"No."

Matt blinked. He'd expected that, and yet... "You've seen a shinigami, dude."

"Creatures from another dimension that kill to steal lifespans. There never was a mention of souls or an afterlife having anything to do with them, to my knowledge."

"Still, that didn't imply other possibilities to you?"

"Implications are a dangerous thing, Matt. Assumptions even more so."

Matt laughed and spun in his chair. "Oh _come on_. You nabbed Kira with, like, nothing _but_ assumptions."

"I did not do so lightly." Near twirled his hair, eyes wandering back to the matchsticks.

"Yeah, yeah. You don't do a damn thing lightly," Matt chided, a lazy grin on his face.

"Do you believe in such things?"

"I don't know, really." Matt stretched his arm past Near to steal a couple of the loose sticks. "I'd like to, considering how many bullets I damn near bit..."

"Mello did." It was almost a question, but not when it came from Near.

Matt brought the matchsticks toward his face and fidgeted with them, his eyes staring off someplace neither of them could truly see. Near placed a few more on top of the tower.

"I see him," Matt said at last, discarding the sticks. He crossed his arms over the armrest and laid his head atop them. "Not _constantly_ or anything. I don't think I'm that far gone yet. But, like... I dream of him, Near. Every damn night I dream of him."

"That's hardly abnormal, considering..." Near let it hang, fingering matchsticks in his lap and staring into the goggles that sat blind in Matt's hair.

"It wouldn't be, if it ended there." Matt sighed and rolled his head to the side so he could look up at Near's face. His big black eyes bore holes in him, like they always did. "I'm not always asleep when he shows up."

Near abandoned the sticks. They rolled along the seat toward his body, slowly, clumsily. "You say that as if it's actually Mello, and not your imagination conjuring him up."

"Because maybe it _is_ him."

"Matt..."

"Believe me, I know what I sound like. But I _do_ see him. I could swear he was with me in the hospital, when I was weaving in and out of coma dreams, like he had to make sure I would live before he could move on. Except he _didn't_ move on. I see him dart around corners when I come down the hall in the morning. I see him in the bathroom mirror. I see him peek out from under this desk sometimes."

Near eyed him warily now. Matt could feel the question he wasn't asking.

"I see him in my room the most. He's got a favorite corner he likes to stand in."

"The empty one," Near stated, not asked, because he knew. Matt's bottom lip trembled.

"Whenever I sleep there, he watches. When I wake up there, he always smiles, but it's sad..."

Near scowled and turned his gaze away. He lifted up off the seat as nonchalantly as he could and fished the matchsticks out from under himself.

"Hey," Matt said, sitting up and turning his chair to face Near properly. He tugged his chin around until they saw eye-to-eye. "It's _only_ then. I don't see him when I'm with—"

"Don't patronize me, Matt," Near said, eyes and voice cold. "I am not jealous of a ghost."

Matt grinned – that easy grin he had that could melt away any scowl – and let his fingers trail off Near's chin and down his throat, where the skin was nigh-translucent and ticklish. He always liked watching Near try not to react to it.

"I mean it, though. He steers clear when you're around, and I've never once seen him grace any corner of _your_ room."

"Flattery is not your strong suit," Near grumbled, Matt's fingers surfing on his adam's apple.

"That's what got me wondering," Matt continued, ignoring the comment, "if you'd ever seen him."

"No," he answered, without pause for consideration. Matt fingered his white shirt collar. It wrinkled easily.

"Not even in your dreams?"

This time he did consider. "Maybe a time or two. I don't often remember my dreams."

Matt hummed. He'd seen Near dream before, been smacked and kicked by a dreaming Near before. Whatever it was he dreamt of might be better off forgotten.

"I've seen others here and there, too. L. Old man Wammy. My mom... But Mello's the most persistent."

He let his fingers walk along Near's shirt buttons. Near caught his hand halfway.

"What's it like?"

"What's what like?"

"Seeing ghosts."

"So you believe me now? Some atheist _you_ are."

"No." A little twitch of a smirk caught on his face. "I'm fairly certain the pain pills and grief are giving you mild hallucinations."

"You suck at flattery too, ya know."

Near pinched his palm, but wouldn't let go of the hand when Matt reflexively tried to yank it away.

"Jerk," he laughed, and bopped Near's dangling socked foot with his boot. Near uncurled his other leg and poked a toe at Matt's ribs. Matt captured his foot and pulled so that Near's chair rolled closer.

Near interlaced his fingers with those of the hand he held hostage, and smiled in the devious way he always smiled, even when he wasn't being devious. "So tell me. Is it frightening? Disturbing?"

"Used to be, at first, but it's not as if they really _do_ anything," Matt said, toying with the elastic of the sock foot in his lap. "Hell, at this point I kinda hope they _are_ real ghosts. I'd probably be pretty damn lonely without them. Worse if they suddenly stop appearing one day just because some doctor decides to switch my meds around."

"I wouldn't want to see them," Near decided, digging a spot of dirt out from under Matt's fingernail.

"Really? Not even to say goodbye or whatever?"

Near frowned deeply, staring at Matt's hand in his. "I doubt my ghosts would be as friendly as yours."

Matt folded himself over Near's leg, bringing their faces close, daring Near to look up and meet him. When he finally did, Matt kissed the tip of his nose and grinned, knowing full well that his grin could melt frowns just as easily as scowls.

"I'd be your friendly ghost, Near."

Colorless lips half-twisted out of their frown and parted as if to laugh. Near's face only knew a handful of expressions, and made an awkward mess of itself when it tried to recombine bits of those into new ones. Matt loved it.

"And I'd drive the bad ghosts away, so they couldn't give you nightmares."

Near leaned his forehead against Matt's, eyes slipping shut. "I'm sure you could."

Matt rubbed their noses together. "You don't need a bunch of ghosts around anyway. I'm _much_ better company all by myself."

"I agree," Near said, and kissed him. His lips were soft and warm, and he hummed into the kiss in the way that always filled Near with a rush of sweet bliss, the way that banished the cold from his heart and reminded him he was human.

Matt chuckled as their mouths broke apart, little warm puffs of laughter tickling Near's lips. "I don't think ghosts can do _that_ , though."

"Thank God you didn't die, then." Matt stared into his eyes, even more big and deep and serious than usual. He shook his head and laughed.

"Seriously? Thank _God_? You're, like, the worst atheist _ever_ , Near."

Those huge eyes rolled, and Near freed himself from the uncomfortable pretzel of limbs they'd wound up in. "It's just an expression, Matt."

"Yeah, yeah, and you don't believe in my ghostie pals either." Matt grabbed his armrest and bumped their chairs together. Near glowered, but Matt knew he wasn't really mad. He had an entirely different face for that.

"I _don't_."

"I know."

"But..," Near said with something approaching a sigh, "I don't mind humoring you." He leaned over the armrests to lay his head on Matt's shoulder. Matt hummed, and Near could feel it through the bone there.

"Since when do you humor anybody?" He began to trail his fingers lazily through Near's wispy white hair.

Near just shrugged, then shuddered as the fingers made his scalp tingle.

"You know, I'm not sure about the whole God thing myself," Matt said, staring off into invisible places again. "Mello tried to push it on me, when we were little. Said it would help me feel better about my mom, to pray for her soul."

Near blinked up at him. "Did it?"

Matt scoffed. "All it did was make me worry that she might be in Hell, and it would be my fault for not praying hard enough, or not being a good enough kid for my prayers to have any sway. I felt a hell of a lot better _before_ , when I just figured dead meant _gone_."

Near shifted, uncomfortable again as the armrest dug into his side. "Scoot over," he mumbled, abandoning his seat. Matt chuckled and obliged, leaving just a tiny bit of extra room in his chair.

"I suppose you feel differently now, considering all this talk of ghosts," Near said, squeezing into the chair and curling up to him, half in his lap. His head returned to its warm spot on Matt's shoulder.

"Comfy?" Matt snickered, wrapping his arms around the skinny albino.

"Yes." He was more 'comfy' with Matt than he'd ever been in his whole life.

"I can't help thinking _somebody_ must have been looking out for me that day..."

"That was Halle, not God."

"Well yeah, her too, but you gotta admit, it was a textbook _miracle_ , Near."

"...some might call it that."

"Well, there you go. Miracle, therefore God," Matt declared, punctuating his points by patting Near's leg. "I mean, it sure as hell wasn't Odin that saved my ass. He would've let me die my epic warrior death and sent me off to Valhalla instead of lettin' Halle drag me off to the ER... You should really give her a raise, by the way."

"I should." Near drew a looping chain of figure-eights up Matt's chest with his finger. He was careful to skirt around the spots where the bullets had hit; the striped shirt hid them, but he knew precisely where they were. "So, miracles imply God, and God implies souls, and souls imply ghosts."

"Pretty much."

"This is precisely what I meant about implications being dangerous, Matt."

"Not dangerous. The existence of ghosts would at least imply that I'm psychic or something instead of just plain _crazy_... and..." His voice began to break, and his hand stilled on Near's thigh and fingers dug in hard, as if it was the one thing keeping him from falling.

"Matt?" He sat up and saw that Matt's green eyes were shiny and wet, like leaflets wearing a sheen of dew, fragile as the matchstick construct on the desk behind him. He suddenly squeezed them shut and shook his head, as if he might will away whatever unsaid thought was hurting him so.

Near had an inkling of what that thought was, and assuming seemed the only way to move forward.

" _And_..," he said, soft, brushing bits of red hair from Matt's face, "it would imply that those people aren't simply gone."

Matt's breath hitched, and he hugged Near tight, burying his face in the wrinkled shirt collar, eyes wetting his collarbone. He made wrenching, choking noises that wanted to be sobs. Near knew those noises well, from long nights curled in a chair beside his hospital bed, from hearing them seep out under Matt's bedroom door, from frustrating nights when they tried to be together and couldn't because everything reminded Matt of Mello. Near hated those noises. They rendered him utterly incompetent.

He held him and hoped that was enough. His thigh ached where Matt had gripped it; he felt it bruising. His throat tightened and burned.

When the hiccupping stopped and his breathing evened out, Matt kissed him fiercely. Caught off guard, Near's mouth was easily plundered. Matt tasted like nicotine gum.

Near tried to run his fingers through his hair. He yanked the goggles off his head because they were in the way. Matt tried to pull him more fully into his lap, though it threw off the chair's balance and threatened to topple it. They leaned too far backwards, and Matt had to let go of Near to grab the armrests and rebalance, laughing into Near's mouth the whole time as he hung on unawares. When they were steady, Matt cupped his cheek and gently pried him off.

"Now _this_ is dangerous," he said, breathless and smiling a gorgeous, contagious smile that outshined the redness in his eyes.

Near stole another quick kiss and feather-touched his neck at the red downy nape.

"My bedroom is safe, in more ways than one." He bit his lip, and a thrill shot up Matt's spine.

"Oh yeah?"

"You said so yourself."

"That's true, wouldn't wanna contradict myself." Matt kissed him once more, long and slow and deep. Near melted into it and whimpered when it ended. Matt grinned to see color flourish on Near's cheeks.

"Shall we?" he asked, voice low, a finger tracing Near's jawline.

" _God_ yes," Near whispered, smiling deviously.

Matt snickered as he eased them both out of the chair. "Wicked little closet-theist... I bet you'll cry out to God instead of calling my name, too."

Something unfamiliar, almost laughter, rumbled out of Near's throat as he led Matt by the hand.

"You really shouldn't assume so much of me, Matt."

* * *

 **A/N:** Alternate title: "Ghosts (Happy Version)." :P

Though I've not done it before, I really love this pairing (and this particular ret-con scenario). It was heavily inspired by other, better N/M fics. And Disney songs. XD

Even the whole running theme of implications/assumptions came from elsewhere – basically, this person really hated Near for catching Kira with "only" assumptions and luck. So I decided to mess with that a bit. :P

Anyway. What I was going for here was the familiarity of an established relationship, without sacrificing sexiness, and without letting them slip out of character. To me, neither of them are truly passive characters, despite appearances. I wanted to show that there's equality here, not just in terms of control, but in their respect for each other, playfulness, and depth of feeling. They both have issues too, but they're (clumsily) helping each other heal.

I was also trying to convey as much of that as possible through actions, avoid overloading it with wordiness, and keep a comfortable, light tone overall despite serious topics and background angst. I _think_ I pulled it off, mostly? Hope so, since I'm rambling so much about it. XD

And yeah, apparently I have a thing for giving Near miracles and ghosts and religious crises to deal with. Not sure what that says about me, as a non-believer myself... XD


End file.
